Cowboy Baseball Completes Comeback In Desert

PHOENIX – Oklahoma State scored six runs over the final two innings and claimed a 7-5 win over Arizona State Tuesday at Phoenix Municipal Stadium.

The win was the third in a row for the No. 4 Cowboys, who improved to 5-2 on the season.

Roman Phansalkar picked up the win in relief to move to 2-1 on the year, while Trevor Martin worked the final 1 2/3 innings to collect his second save.

Brett Brown had a big swing of the bat off the bench and finished the contest with three RBIs, while Nolan McLean was 2-for-3 with a home run.

ASU (3-5) took an early lead on a solo home run by Conor Davis in the first, and an RBI double by Davis made the score 2-0 in the third.

The Cowboys cut their deficit in half when McLean led off the fourth with his second home run of the season, an opposite field shot to right.

But the Sun Devils would get the run back in the sixth, this time on an RBI single by Kai Murphy that ended Victor Mederos' night on the mound. Mederos worked five innings, allowing three runs on nine hits and striking out five.

The home team went up 4-1 after seven, but game turned in the eighth.

In that inning, the Cowboys took advantage of an error and back-to-back walks to load the bases with no outs. Brown then stepped to the plate as a pinch hitter and ripped a double into the left-center field gap that cleared the bases and tied the score.

After a strikeout, a hit by pitch and another walk, the bases were once again loaded for a Cowboy pinch hitter. This time it was Jaxson Crull coming off the bench to deliver as he smacked a single to left field to put OSU on top, 5-4.

The Pokes added a pair of insurance runs in the ninth on a single by Garrett Martin and an RBI groundout by Marcus Brown to make the score 7-4.

ASU managed to push across a run in its final at bat and brought the go-ahead run to the plate with two outs before Martin slammed the door on the comeback attempt.

The two teams conclude the midweek series Wednesday at 2 p.m. CST.